


in thy hand unbated

by Elsinore_and_Inverness



Category: Discworld - Terry Pratchett
Genre: Anxiety, Breakfast, Gen, Nightmares, Post- The Truth, Some people?? use murder ballads?? to cope??, this fic may be a bit of a lullaby idk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-22
Updated: 2020-10-22
Packaged: 2021-03-08 23:33:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,346
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27144559
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elsinore_and_Inverness/pseuds/Elsinore_and_Inverness
Summary: The pattern of the knocks on the door of the bedroom meant Rufus Drumknott was outside.
Relationships: Rufus Drumknott & Havelock Vetinari
Comments: 2
Kudos: 24





	1. Chapter 1

Rufus had woken up in the pitch dark his entire life. It was an advantage in any situation where you wanted more hours in the day, and the source of restless, empty time in which even Ankh-Morpork seemed devoid of life. A grey city, like a charcoal drawing, or an empty, unfinished theatrical set. Between the hours of three and five in the morning the part of the world that people had woven together was swept off the stage and Rufus felt, even more than the rest of the time, like folding up small and not disturbing the silence. Like he would defile the freshly fallen snow of the night just by looking at it. He had put some work in to not seeing this idiosyncrasy, his need for about half as much sleep as most people, as something transgressive and wrong.

But now he woke up from a dream of pain and confusion, the repetitive reconstruction of violence too messy for the delicate instrument that had delivered it. Vetinari’s knives were extremely sharp, designed to be used with precision rather than force. Rufus would not be surprised to hear that his employer had taken some kind of twisted Hippocratic oath to only kill painlessly. It was a good job Charlie hadn’t _broken_ the knife.

There had been moments Rufus had doubted, away from the ears of the press, not that Vetinari would intentionally hurt him, but that the Patrician had a breaking point and that it had not been all that far away. That was what was insidious about the ‘character assassination’ plot and why so many guild leaders had bought into it. Vetinari was odd, and not well, and every other Patrician had ended badly.

Vetinari could not afford be close to losing his grip. Even if the city were ready to be without him, which it wasn’t, if he were removed from office the threat he inherently posed meant nowhere would be safe. There was no possibility of a soft landing.

The dream had left Rufus shaking, and he realized he had turned onto his back, putting pressure on the wound in his shoulder.

Sitting up in the dark, he poured water from a jug into a bowl and splashed it onto his face. This was unnecessary; he was already wide-awake and clear-headed, but it gave him something to do.

Thinking of Vetinari, Drumknott felt like his chest was closing up. They’d had so many close calls, and he wasn’t sure he would have the skill or stamina to carry on without him.

Rufus was good in a crisis, constantly mentally running through worst-case scenarios can have that effect, but afterwards it was hard to adjust to the fact that it was over.

There was no one in the palace who was going to stab him. His Lordship was two corridors away, in bed asleep, quite safe. If he could just stop physically trembling. If it would stop hurting so much to breathe.

The light of the moon, more than crescent, less than half, shone on the frost on the double lancet windows and pale grey chenille curtains.

Because it would force his breath to be steady if he could just get the sound out, in a high, whispery voice, he started to sing.

“Why dois your brand sae drap wi bluid,  
And why sae sad gang yee O?’  
‘O I hae killed my hauke sae guid…’”

\---

An hour before dawn, a note slipped under the door—his Lordship thought he was being cute and he was not mistaken in that assessment—informed him that the Patrician wanted to have breakfast with him. This happened about one day in three, and on occasion Vetinari would come down to the kitchen and eat with everyone else, which made everyone else uncomfortable, but they could hardly begrudge him having moments where he wanted to be around people.

There were various small rooms in the palace apartments. Vetinari was waiting in one near the Oblong Office. Drumknott had brought a mixture of grains and seeds, somewhere between granola and muesli.

The Patrician was the picture of composure. He’d trimmed his beard, washed his hair and left it alone—the palace was on soft water—brushed makeup over the faded bruises, and generally did not look at all like someone who had been sleeping for days. He was also watching him intently.

“Good morning, Drumknott.”

Rufus sat at the table and poured tea. Chamomile, unusual for six in the morning, but if he was going to have any hope of getting anything done today he needed to feel less anxious, not more awake.

Vetinari had made porridge out of oats soaked in yogurt. He had not been eating, so he was cautious of what his stomach would take. He watched Drumknott pour his grain concoction into a bowl with a mixture of bemusement and glassy-eyed hunger.

“I had nightmares. I didn’t, in the cells, but now that we’re back…”

Vetinari ate a spoonful of porridge far more thoughtfully than anyone should eat a spoonful of porridge. “It is, perhaps, unorthodox, but should you require a friend, I extend the invitation.”

“I’m not going to wake you up in the middle of the night.”

“You are trembling and have an elevated heart rate.”

Drumknott sighed.

“With the amount that you write in a day, you end up putting strain even on the shoulder that you’re not using. I am going require a reduction in your workload the next several days.”

“Do you ever think about how Captain Carrot got shot through the shoulder and shoved a sword into solid stone minutes later?”

Vetinari sipped the chamomile and said “I was wondering about the setting of the Edward ballad. Whose was it? It wasn’t one I’ve seen before.”

“You heard that?” Rufus asked, blushing “It wasn’t… I suppose it would be mine, but I haven’t heard the song, I’ve just—“

“Just seen it written down?” Vetinari beamed like sun on an icicle.


	2. Chapter 2

The pattern of the knocks on the door of the bedroom meant Rufus Drumknott was outside.

Lord Vetinari opened his eyes. The room had no window, so the only thing that could be seen was the rectangle of the outline of the door from the sparse torchlight along the hallway outside.

“It’s unlocked.”

The door creaked open. The unoiled hinge was better security than could be brought by any number of pick-resistant locks.

Rufus was wearing slippers. By default he did not make any sound when he walked but when it came to padding around the apartments in the middle of the night he made sure to make padding-around-the-apartments-in-the-middle-of-the-night noises.

“Nightmares again?”

Rufus stood silhouetted in the dim light of the hall. The diffuse orange of firelight faded to grey further from the torches. “Do you have nightmares?”

“Well, there’s one where I’m trapped in a burning building and all my teeth are falling out.”

“I don’t think that’s what I mean.” Rufus lit a candle and squinted at the wick as it turned black and frayed in the center of drop of gold light.

“I don’t like the taste of garlic anymore,” Vetinari said, blinking in the sudden light.

“Amaya Katerina will be so pleased.”

“No she wouldn’t.”

“No,” Rufus agreed.

“The actual vegetable has been known to give rats forty percent resistance to arsenic. There might be something to the signatory theory of herbology after all.”

Rufus pulled the door shut and yawned into his hand.

“Are you— Do you want to—“ Vetinari moved so his back was a couple inches from the wall. It was a narrow bed, but there was enough space for Rufus to lie down.

There was something comforting in just being close enough to feel radiant heat without touching. The sound of quiet breathing was more of a soporific than Rufus had expected, even if it was occasionally accompanied by Havelock’s digestive system making noises that sounded like nothing so much as a mechanical device recalibrating.

Rufus just remembered to snuff out the candle before slipping into warm, gentle sleep.


End file.
